What Is The One Aspect of Brewing That Is Least Important to Brewing a Good Beer? (In Your Opinion)

[NewJersey]

Sparging

 

[beren]

I no longer heat my sparge water, it may take longer to get to a boil, but less effort.

Same effort, more time

 

[kingmatt]

Efficiency.

This is the answer if we are only picking one.

I only get around 60% efficiency with my setup but my beers are consistently good and grain is (relatively) cheap.

 

[Paulo Jurza]

I no longer heat my sparge water, it may take longer to get to a boil, but less effort.

I do the same - also less gas/electricity...

 

[Paulo Jurza]

The things you mention are the process, and are the most important parts.

The part that is for me least concern of the brewing process, is actually the kit. I brew using household implements and (food safe) plastic buckets. What do I have in addition, that can not be missed:

• a pH meter, because my recipes are always different. If you always brew a couple of the same beers, one could dispense with that
• A grain mill. Because here on the European continent there are no (not much?) shops where ground malt can be ordered.
• An RO filter, because our water here contains too much carbonates and does not have proper balanced minerals for beer.

I actually dispense with electronic temperature control, because I don't have the place for such a system. I choose a room with a relatively constant temperature and use that. Also try to use yeasts that are appropriate for this.

Here in Brasil almost all shops ground malts for irrisory ou null prices...
I do not use a pH meter because it is dispensable in my batch sizes...
I use a black charcoal filter only to hold the chlorine of the tap water and some sort of impurities (and use 4 drops of Vitamin C to kill the rest of chlorine)
And I must have a fridge or a kegerator to ferment, because temperatures could reach up 30 degrees Celsius at noon and 15 at night generating too much esterification... When I started to use the controlled temperature my beers rised up several grades of approval...

 

[mac_1103]

I do the same - also less gas/electricity.

How? You have to get it all up to boiling eventually one way or the other.

 

[Paulo Jurza]

How? You have to get it all up to boiling eventually one way or the other.

When we pour the sparge water it always got colder than before - so it will be needed to heat it up again... And there is a lot of water absorption in the grains that will stay with your pre-heated water... No heating the sparge water reduces the loss - my grains end up colder than before, so I don´t loose this heat to the thrash. At the end of the story, I prefer this way, because I don´t have to find room to heat water before the sparge - I live at an apartment. Of course if I´ll brew 1000 liters, I will heat up the sparge water... But in a facility other than my tiny kitchen....

 

[mac_1103]

When we pour the sparge water it always got colder than before - so it will be needed to heat it up again.

This is, at best, a negligible difference. All the water has to get to 100C/212F. Heat it now or heat it later. Just don't heat it any higher than your mash temp if you want to save that little bit of energy.

OTOH, lots of people prefer use the time while they're mashing to heat the sparge water so it doesn't take as long to get the whole thing up to boiling.

 

[Ninoid]

Here in Brasil almost all shops ground malts for irrisory ou null prices...
I do not use a pH meter because it is dispensable in my batch sizes...
I use a black charcoal filter only to hold the chlorine of the tap water and some sort of impurities (and use 4 drops of Vitamin C to kill the rest of chlorine)
And I must have a fridge or a kegerator to ferment, because temperatures could reach up 30 degrees Celsius at noon and 15 at night generating too much esterification... When I started to use the controlled temperature my beers rised up several grades of approval...

You can use Saison or Kveik yeast for this temperatures.

 

[chthon]

Here in Brasil almost all shops ground malts for irrisory ou null prices...
I do not use a pH meter because it is dispensable in my batch sizes...
I use a black charcoal filter only to hold the chlorine of the tap water and some sort of impurities (and use 4 drops of Vitamin C to kill the rest of chlorine)
And I must have a fridge or a kegerator to ferment, because temperatures could reach up 30 degrees Celsius at noon and 15 at night generating too much esterification... When I started to use the controlled temperature my beers rised up several grades of approval...

So some of these process things are even geographically related.

 

[BrewerofBeers]

The label. I, myself, really just need to know what's in the bottles. Anything else, not my job.
Please enjoy the beer.

 

[amber-ale]

Squeezing….lots of work for not much gain. Let it drip by itself
Or crystal clear beer…. It gets served in a frosted mug anyway…..all tastes the same, lot-less fuss

 

[dmtaylor]

It gets served in a frosted mug anyway…..

O Canada...

 

[cmac62]

The label. I, myself, really just need to know what's in the bottles. Anything else, not my job.
Please enjoy the beer.

I don't soak off the old labels either.

 

[Yeast Farmer]

For me, the least important thing is water chemistry. When I got back into brewing a couple years ago and made the jump to all-grain, I did a ton of research and got really worried about water chemistry, and even bought some test kits. I ended up never using them, and I never do anything to my water (unchlorinated well water). Maybe I'm just lucky, but I've brewed everything from pale lagers to imperial stouts, and it all tastes great. If you drink your tap water, don't worry about it.

On top of that, I never take hydrometer readings. I don't care about numbers, and I'm not going to do things differently next time because a number isn't what it's supposed to be. The recipe is what it is, the process is what it is, it works and I like the results.

 

[beren]

I would agree water can be ignored but only if your water is good for brewing the style you are making ;-) and numbers give you an abv, let you know if your fermentation is stuck or done, etc.

 

[mac_1103]

Yeah, water might be the least important thing about brewing if you're lucky. Or the most important if you're not.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

For me, the least important thing is water chemistry. When I got back into brewing a couple years ago and made the jump to all-grain, I did a ton of research and got really worried about water chemistry, and even bought some test kits. I ended up never using them, and I never do anything to my water (unchlorinated well water). Maybe I'm just lucky, but I've brewed everything from pale lagers to imperial stouts, and it all tastes great. If you drink your tap water, don't worry about it.

+1 for talking about your approach to water.

---

Well water and municipal water (treated with chloride or chloramine) can be low in minerals and suitable for brewing many styles without adjustments.

And one approach to water can be "just brew with it".

If the beer comes out good, brew it again.

But if the beer comes out badly, then understanding mineral content of the source water will be helpful in understanding what may have gone wrong.

There are "many ways to brew it well".

 

[Ninoid]

In my place, tap water is good and beer, both light and dark, is good. I brewed at a friend's house several times with his water and only the Stout was relatively good, while the light beers tasted completely different, worse, than with my water. His water is obviously too hard and it shows in the taste, so I agree that water chemistry doesn't matter if you have good water for the styles that brewed.

 

[beren]

Honestly I guess I get not wanting to worry about details, but brewing is at least as much science as art. I could brew without a thermometer, scale, or, timer, but why do that? I’ve seen way too many people say they brewed their best beer ever, and have no idea what they did. That would make me profoundly sad. Also if when something goes wrong you have less/no information what happened/changed. Let’s say your mill loosens and your gap is .07 and you don’t notice. Your mash eff. will likely tank, you’ll over hop, you’ll have a watery beer and not know it because you didn’t get a pre or post boil gravity.

 

[A.Homebrewer]

Bottle or keg as long as it is done properly.

 

[Langerz]

Yeah, water might be the least important thing about brewing if you're lucky. Or the most important if you're not.

And it's pretty hard to be lucky across styles. From my standpoint my home water would probably be fine. It's good tasting water, but it isn't consistent. They have a few sources they draw from. Mainly the river but when run off is too high in the river they draw from well etc. You can taste it in the water when they make the change. Probably would make good beer either way, but I started adjusting my water to avoid wondering if say a change I made to an IPA was due to a change I made to the recipe or that they changed the water source a bit that day.

And at least for me the time I spend on water is pretty minimal other than filling the jugs with RO at Walmart. The people watching opportunity is well worth that extra time though.

 

[KiwiBruce]

Water chemistry for extract brewing, and I have very hard water, but with LME it just doesn't matter...that said in an All Grain it's very important.
The most important thing...keep very good records and notes!

 

[user 338926]

Secondary fermentation. Totally unnecessary. Actually counterproductive for most applications. Positively useless if you have a conical fermenter.

 

[beren]

Water chemistry for extract brewing, and I have very hard water, but with LME it just doesn't matter...that said in an All Grain it's very important.
The most important thing...keep very good records and notes!

Eh. Sulfate to chloride ratio matters. I had to adjust in the keg because a malty beer was too sharp. Some CaCl helped a lot.

 

[redrocker652002]

In my case, and I did not read thru all the pages of the thread, getting to wrapped up in any one part of the process. I have to remind myself I am not a pro, so if I miss my numbers, the ABV is a bit high or low, or anything in between, I had to learn to say "screw it" and let it do it's thing. Patience and enjoyment of the process should be fun, not a stressful event. In my opinion, don't sweat it, enjoy the process, let the beer do what it is going to do, and drink it like you stole it. LOL. Rock On!!!!!!!

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Water chemistry for extract brewing, and I have very hard water, but with LME it just doesn't matter

When you say "water chemistry" what are you referring to? With "extract brewing", source water quality definitely matters (for example, removing chlorine & chloramines). Flavor salt additions are not necessary, but these additions can (and do) make a good beer better.